


i pray through a megaphone

by captainofthegreenpeas



Category: Original Work
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M, Implied Murder, Modern AU, Power Couple, Revenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2020-01-01 03:16:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18327518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainofthegreenpeas/pseuds/captainofthegreenpeas
Summary: Laurence and Laylia try to maintain a semblance of normality as they go about their daily business. Alternatively, Thou Shalt Not Miss Thy Daughter's Dance Recital.A Modern AU to the universe of my story the holy and the fool





	i pray through a megaphone

**Author's Note:**

> For some reason I decided to set this Modern AU in the US. It seemed to fit, somehow.  
> I picked Whole Foods because it's the only American supermarket I've heard of apart from Walmart. Also I'm British so apologies for any Britishisms that slipped in here.

A square of light capped the ridge of the covers where his toes were. Laurence could hear the smacking of water against the shower floor. Every morning in their spartan bedroom felt like waking up in army barracks, until he remembered that his wife came of military stock. 

One-of-those-days was starting to dawn. Laurence wanted to roll over and go back to sleep, but he felt like a corpse from the waist down. The steady ache that hovered in the background during the day always came to the forefront when there was nothing else to think about. He could hear the drag of the shower door, and a few minutes later Laylia padded across the room, wet hair combed, to where she had laid out their clothes the night before. 

“Did I wake you?” Laylia asked with unusual gentleness. 

“No.” He mumbled.

“No need to get up. I’ll pick up your prescription on my way to Whole Foods.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“Are you sure? You ought to rest-“

“No, I’m fine. I’d rather rest tomorrow.”

“You’re not missing church, you’ll set a bad example for the kids. Consider it rest for your soul.” Laylia laced her boot emphatically at the end of the bed. 

Twenty minutes later, the two walked out under a milk white sky, Laylia marching ahead and Laurence pacing patiently behind. Laylia growled in frustration as she began to tug the driver’s seat forward. Clambering in, she made to fix Laurence’s seatbelt. 

“I can do it,” Laurence snapped. “I’m disabled, not a baby.”

“Just trying to help.” Laylia started the engine and they set off. 

“We really ought to have a less memorable car,” Laurence warned as they stormed down the road. “No one else we know has a truck.”

“No one else we know needs a truck.”

“We don’t need a truck, you need a truck so the other drivers scatter before you.”

“Yes.”

Laurence sighed, his mind running through variables. Journeys were always a good place to think, between the stillness and silence and the steady slide of the world and the cars around them. Eventually he broke the silence.

“Olwen’s still going on about the Wailing Man.” 

“I thought she’d grow out of it by now. “

“Perhaps… if she were to sleep a little more soundly….”

“I am not drugging up our daughter.”

“In the long run, wouldn’t it be for her own good? How’s she supposed to get the kind of grades you want if she keeps waking up in the night?”

“In the long run, sleeping pills wear off. What if there’s an emergency and we need her to be asleep? What if we gave her too many?”

With that statement hanging in the air, the two of them chose silence. 

“Don’t forget you’re going to Laura’s basketball game next week,” Laylia told Laurence as she scanned the shopping list. “It’s Olwen’s spelling bee the same day, I can’t do both.”

“I think Olwen would prefer to see you at her dance recital.”

“The spelling bee is more important-“

“I’ll go instead.”

“But what about Laura’s game-“

“I mean, I’ll go watch her dance recital and applaud and make sure she doesn’t eat too many sweets, though you can’t make me talk to the other parents.”

Laylia looked around furtively. “You can’t,” she whispered. “We agreed, you know what’s happening that night, we have to make sure-“

“We will. There’s enough time. Aggie can drop me off at the recital, you can take us all home, then Laura puts Olwen to bed and we go.”

Across the hall, a woman was staring at them. While Laylia chose the bananas that she calculated would be ripe at the perfect time in her plans, the woman cautiously walked over to them.

“I just wanted to thank you for serving our country,” the stranger told Laurence. 

“I’m not a veteran.” 

“Oh…” Embarrassment stole the stranger’s voice. 

“But I did once help a cat down from a tree. Or was it a burning building? Either way, I’ll take your thanks for that.”

“She’s still watching us,” Laylia said out of the corner of her mouth, once they were bagging up their shopping.

“I’ll book the hitman.”

“Laurence!”

“I was joking!”  
“In future, I think we should get Aggie to do the shopping-“

“That would only make us look suspect.” He whispered in her ear, then tugged at her arm as she continued to watch the woman across the hall. 

Laylia started to breathe more deeply as they walked across the parking lot. Laurence bit his lip against the pain, the truck was not too far, he could sit down soon. 

“I want to stop off at the church.”

“You can pray while you drive.”

“But I’ve got to make sure He’s listening-“

“He can’t miss you, you pray through a megaphone.”

Once the bags were in the trunk and the doors were shut, Laylia leaned her head against the top of the steering wheel and closed her eyes.

“Have a little faith in me.” Laurence stroked the back of Laylia’s neck, and between her shoulder blades. “Follow my lead, and in time, I will give you the revenge you seek.”

Eulalia’s hands tightened. “Will you?”

“Of course I will. When could I ever deny my sweet girl anything?”


End file.
